Virginia Democrats’ push for new gun controls is having a major ripple effect hundreds of miles south in Florida, where at least 10 counties, fearing their state could be next, have declared themselves “Second Amendment sanctuaries.”

With residents’ backing, county commissioners have passed resolutions saying they will resist efforts by higher-ups to force gun registration or even confiscation of firearms already in citizens’ hands.

On Saturday, gun rights activists plan to rally at government offices in Santa Rosa County, which lies in the Panhandle section of the state with its dense population of military and veterans, hoping to send a message of support to local commissioners and a warning to the Florida legislature not to follow Virginia’s path.

James Varney
January 16, 2020
‘God-given right’: Virginia Democrats set off ‘Second Amendment sanctuary’ spree in Florida
[We live in interesting times.

Maybe we could some day soon, as in a year or two, start seeing prosecutions for civil rights violations.—Joe]

From Virginia:

“I just have to say that this is something that’s been recommended by our Capitol Police. And I think there are times when we sort of have to trust what our law enforcement officers are telling us,” House Majority Leader Charniele Herring said.

But Capitol Police Col. Anthony Pike said after the vote that he made no recommendations on whether guns should be banned, only on how to implement the ban Democrats wanted. The new policy will require that everyone entering the Capitol, except for lawmakers, must go through a metal detector.

GOP lawmakers accused Democrats of rushing through an unnecessary policy and then trying to lay it at the feet of Capitol Police.

“That was a deliberate misrepresentation,” said GOP Del. Kirk Cox. “There’s just no way around that.”

Lying. It’s part of their nature.

Gun control racist roots harm minority communities and women by creating barriers to inherent right to self defense. Those that support gun control are progressing backwards to time of racial divide where gun control was used to legislate freed slaves defenseless. These gun control legislation, I-1639, ERPO laws, will continue to create racial inequality, racial-economic stratification and violate human rights.

Gun Rights Coalition
January 9, 2020
Gun Rights Coalition to Rally at State Capitol
[The referenced state capital is Olympia Washington:

The Gun Rights Coalition will descend on the Washington State Capitol from 8:30 a.m. to noon on Jan. 17 as it plans to rally for gun rights at the start of a new legislative session.

I really; want to be there but it just won’t be possible this time.—Joe]

Enforcing the constitution, it’s just not in words. Our commitment to this is engraved on the police memorial that you walked by when you came in here which has the names of the police officers and sheriff’s deputies who gave up their blood, their life in blood, to enforce the constitution of the United States and we don’t intend to not do that anymore. But furthermore, I tell you this board and every public safety officer that works for Chesterfield County takes an oath that they will uphold and follow the constitution of the United States. We’re doing what you want us to do, and we will continue to do that.

Stephen A. Elswick
Vice Chair, MATOACA MAGISTERIAL DISTRICT
December 20, 2019
Supervisors’ letter to lawmakers: Uphold the Constitution
[It was probably in the late 1990s when I asked Alan Gottlieb of SAF how can people deal with the unconstitutional gun laws when the Federal Courts didn’t seem to be supportive. His answer was that it really was the job of the states to respond and rein in the Federal government. I’m reminded of this by the sanctuary county/city stuff going on now. There is a similar activity at the state level but hasn’t received as much notice.

It’s all good stuff but as others have observed, it’s not going to be all that effective until politicians are being prosecuted.—Joe]

Ebbin and his fellow Democrats simply want to feel safe, and that means endangering the safety of everyone they happen to disagree with that will come for the protest in February. After all, it’s funny how only the side he disagrees with will be impacted, despite the complete lack of violence.

Then again, sticking it to your enemies is an age-old political tactic.

Tom Knighton
December 27, 2019
VA Democrats Want To Ban Carrying Gun In State Capitol Grounds
[Such activities must not go unanswered. Otherwise they will continue to encroach upon our rights.

The gun rights side of the political aisle need to have a good way of “sticking it to their enemies” and play a game of tit for tat. I’m inclined to suggest prosecution and imprisonment but we aren’t there yet.—Joe]

Politicians know that the groundswell of peaceful pro-gun activism is backed up by something harder. That’s why in the near term they’re most likely to try and erode support for “assault weapons” and legislate them out of existence, as opposed to confiscate everyone’s AR-15s… for now.

Samuel Culper
December 23, 2019
Eyes on Virginia 2020 – Here’s what to expect
[Via email from Tony.

Scott Adams almost categorically dismisses slippery slope arguments in the general case, not just in the case of gun control. I mostly disagree with him. Here, and in the post this quote was taken from, Culper alludes to my disagreement with Adams.

Adams, in his most recent book, Loserthink: How untrained brains Are Ruining America, elaborates more on this. He says, if I recall correctly, that it’s a slippery slope only until something changes.and then it isn’t. In the case of gun control case he claims travel down the slope will continue only until gun owners stop it. Things that are not terribly unpopular will be enacted, perhaps background checks for retail sales, but that doesn’t affect the probability of gun confiscation. They are two different, unrelated things. Gun owners, and even many non-gunowners, will put up much stronger resistance to gun confiscation and the slide down the slope is stopped.

I don’t see it that way.

As Culper points out, the political response is to make it costly to be a gun owner. Not just in dollars and thing like requiring insurance and difficult licensing procedures but in risk and day to day hassle. I went to the range with a friend in Canada a while back. Each gun had to be unloaded, a trigger lock installed, then locked in a case, and put in the trunk of the car in order to transport it from his home to the range and back. If he were to have lost a trigger lock while at the range he could not have legally transported the gun back home without the risk of going to prison. The “gun-free zone” within 1000 feet of a school is another example of a cost imposed on gun ownership through increased risk of committing a victimless crime.

As these costs increase it decreases the number of people who are willing to pay the “price”. Each of these relatively small price increases is not sufficient to take a bunch of time off work or to donate a lot of money to help defeat it like you would if it were something like confiscation of America’s most popular rifle. Yet, because the increasing cost of gun ownership it means fewer gun owners which means there is less resistance to the next slide down the slope. Whereas in Adams view you get increased resistance as you slide down the slope.

We both see the slope as non-linear but he sees the slope as upturning and stopping further progress and I see it as downturning and increasing progress.

I claim we can see support for my view on two different slopes.

Look at the slippery slope the anti-gun people are on. For decades they fought the passage of concealed carry licensing laws as they slowly swept the nation. Now Constitutional Carry is slowly spreading. I remember people saying licensing our rights was actually a step in the wrong direction for us. It should be “Vermont Carry”, as what we now call Constitutional Carry was called 20 years ago, or nothing because once the right to carry was licensed we couldn’t get back to a principled claim of right to carry without a license. The anti-gun people have been sliding down this slope for something like 30 years now with no end in sight.

On the other side we can see the march of restrictions on “assault weapons” up and down the west and east costal states. Each year they come up with another type of restriction or cost to add to the burden of owning and using them. Had the anti-gun people gone for an outright ban and demand for confiscation, again about 30 years ago, few politicians would have given the ideas support. This year people hoping to become president seem to be competing on who can confiscate them in the shortest period of time. We have slid down a slippery slope. Those early restrictions enabled further restrictions as soon as the legislature reconvened the next year.

On the other hand Adam could say the 2^nd Amendment Sanctuary movement proves his point.

Am I missing something? Adams is a smart guy and I may too close to this issue to see the issue clearly. Is there some special case situation that Adams would concede in my examples while being substantially correct in the more general case?—Joe]